House Prices & The Economy? What About Bl**dy Utility Bills!

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Last few months, I have had a headache with (all) my utility companies. Maybe it's a sign of the times. People not paying their bills etc, and they are just sending out letters to scare people but believe me I always pay my bills on time and in full, because I like a stress free life.

Today topped it off for me, I have just received a bill for an old address demanding payment for this years charges or my details will be forwarded to a debt recovery agency. I'm still in shock.

Got me thinking. I hate utility companies as much as I hate Estate Agents. But what are my options?

Solar panels - will these be enough so I can disconnect my electricity company?

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Last few months, I have had a headache with (all) my utility companies. Maybe it's a sign of the times. People not paying their bills etc, and they are just sending out letters to scare people but believe me I always pay my bills on time and in full, because I like a stress free life.

Today topped it off for me, I have just received a bill for an old address demanding payment for this years charges or my details will be forwarded to a debt recovery agency. I'm still in shock.

Got me thinking. I hate utility companies as much as I hate Estate Agents. But what are my options?

Solar panels - will these be enough so I can disconnect my electricity company?

Living in a tent - will I get out of paying council tax?

Any ideas much appreciated.

Ask to see a true copy of a signed contract between yourself and the utility company.

If they can't produce one, tell them to get stuffed.

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Last few months, I have had a headache with (all) my utility companies. Maybe it's a sign of the times. People not paying their bills etc, and they are just sending out letters to scare people but believe me I always pay my bills on time and in full, because I like a stress free life.

Today topped it off for me, I have just received a bill for an old address demanding payment for this years charges or my details will be forwarded to a debt recovery agency. I'm still in shock.

Got me thinking. I hate utility companies as much as I hate Estate Agents. But what are my options?

Solar panels - will these be enough so I can disconnect my electricity company?

Living in a tent - will I get out of paying council tax?

Any ideas much appreciated.

You have no options in Britain. Getting off the grid will be a lengthy and expensive venture.

We Brits have had centuries to legislate every detail about essential life services.

EDIT: I should add that family of mine has done a lot of research into solar, wind, ground source, etc.... The ROI is very long, and you always need a back up in the form of a genny or a massive battery bank. Besides, with all this talk of 'green' appliances, you will be very very hard pressed to find small current and efficient machines to use the trickle of energy created by non-fossils.

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Ahh yes. Utilities and council tax. The hidden tax on home ownership and impossible to avoid (unless you're an MP)

This has been the trend over the last few years while not increasing income tax was a manifesto promise. It seemed like a good idea to load all the stealth taxes on home owners. After all they were making a fortune from rising values and hardly anyone noticed the increases.

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Ahh yes. Utilities and council tax. The hidden tax on home ownership and impossible to avoid (unless you're an MP)

This has been the trend over the last few years while not increasing income tax was a manifesto promise. It seemed like a good idea to load all the stealth taxes on home owners. After all they were making a fortune from rising values and hardly anyone noticed the increases.

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Solar panels - will these be enough so I can disconnect my electricity company?

No point even looking at solar until you've reduced your consumption enormously. Even if we dumped the tumbledryer, and cut back on use of the rest of the appliances (all A or A+ ratings) then our use will run to about 7 KWh per day.

If you are serious then get yourself an energy monitor. I've got an one and it's been handy to discover that things like the satellite boxes use about 30W on standby (so that's 0.72 KWh per day). Even things like the telephone answering machine and the digital clock radio can add about another few hundred Watt hours to the daily total. The TV uses approx 100-120W so if that's on for 4 hours per day then there goes another 0.5Kwh.

I reckon that if we dumped the TV + related stuff, went back to a non-powered phone, used a manual alarm clock, made careful and frugal use of the washing machine and dishwasher. Cooked only once per day (electric oven and hob) and rationed computer use then we could get by on about 4 Kwh per day. If we did this then maybe solar PV could meet our needs. Only problem is then our annual electric bill would be about Â£200 so spending Â£8-10K on the PV panels would have a 40 year+ payback time.

Sod it. We should just go Victorian and dump all electrical items, then we wouldn't need PV.

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I reckon that if we dumped the [....] then we could get by on about 4 Kwh per day. If we did this then maybe solar PV could meet our needs. Only problem is then our annual electric bill would be about Â£200 so spending Â£8-10K on the PV panels would have a 40 year+ payback time.

To those of you who are disappointed that our first product is not for residential homeowners, we can reassure you that we do have a fabulous residential solution on our near-term roadmap -- one that will bring the utility scale economics of Nanosolar Utility Panel technology to homes everywhere, and completely redefine how residential solar is done.

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Ahh yes. Utilities and council tax. The hidden tax on home ownership and impossible to avoid (unless you're an MP)

This has been the trend over the last few years while not increasing income tax was a manifesto promise. It seemed like a good idea to load all the stealth taxes on home owners. After all they were making a fortune from rising values and hardly anyone noticed the increases.

Too right! And utility bills and council tax eat up a huge proportion income. OAPs are expecially hard hit. It really is heat or eat. As for council tax, it's a killer for pensioners who have a little over the savings limit (through scrimping and saving for retirement all their lives) so that they cannot claim any pension guarantee credit or council tax benefits. Worse still, their meagre savings now attract so little interest and thus income that they'd be far better off never having saved for their retirement.

Our MPs don't have a clue. As for their gold-plated pensions .... words fail me!

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No one likes paying for anything on this board, what kind of priorities do people have out there. I would think paying Â£90.00 to Â£200.00 per month for ESSENTIAL utilities is the norm and kind of necessary for survival.

If you were to try to be totally self-sufficient in all necessary things and maintain your current quality of life you would soon find that you spent all your time locating sources of potable water, carrying water, maintaining/developing power supplies, growing crops. Etc.

You'd be knackered most of the time and ultimately it would be more expensive in both time and resources to do any of these things on such a micro scale.

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Anybody else have shocking utility bills after the Winter? My gas bill for a modest 3 bed terraced house was almost Â£500 for a quarter. F*cking outrageous! Going to have to freeze this Winter.

Bloke in our office always ran his heating 24/7 whenever it got even slightly cold - "No point being tight with one of the essentials of life". He was paying Â£150 a month for his direct debit, which I found stunning.

Anyway, he got his gas and electricity bills for the the winter quarter - Â£1200!!!!

He's changed his tune now...

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Bloke in our office always ran his heating 24/7 whenever it got even slightly cold - "No point being tight with one of the essentials of life". He was paying Â£150 a month for his direct debit, which I found stunning.

Anyway, he got his gas and electricity bills for the the winter quarter - Â£1200!!!!

He's changed his tune now...

My heating goes off at night!

I only moved into this new rented place 6 months ago so it's possible that it could be very inefficient but I suspect it's mostly the way these jokers have put prices up.

I can't even begin to imagine how the poor and the elderly are managing.

Well done New Labour! Wages static for a decade whilst everything around us is rocketing in price - Council Tax, gas/electric, food, transport...

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Solar PV has the potential to be viable within the next 2-3 years. Nanosolar have claimed that they can manufacture a thin film pv for $0.3 and sell it at a profit at $1/watt. That is about a quarter of the present cost. There are also grants available to help with installation and its possible to have an export meter to get paid for times when you are generating more than you use.

You can either use batteries or get a grid tie inverter like this one which avoids expensive sparkie costs

I'm presently using a solar system to power my garden lighting with many led lights. If (when) the cost of panels comes down I'll be seriously looking at adding a few to the ring main. It gives me a nice warm feeling to see the garden lit up at night, knowing I'm not paying the bastards at the utility companies a penny !

Before you spend out on the panels however, you have to get all appliances down to the minimum possible. Every watt counts if you are serious about getting off grid.

Edited June 4, 2009 by sikejsudjek

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Last few months, I have had a headache with (all) my utility companies. Maybe it's a sign of the times. People not paying their bills etc, and they are just sending out letters to scare people but believe me I always pay my bills on time and in full, because I like a stress free life.

Today topped it off for me, I have just received a bill for an old address demanding payment for this years charges or my details will be forwarded to a debt recovery agency. I'm still in shock.

Got me thinking. I hate utility companies as much as I hate Estate Agents. But what are my options?

Solar panels - will these be enough so I can disconnect my electricity company?

Living in a tent - will I get out of paying council tax?

Any ideas much appreciated.

Solar Panels in the UK? Do you only want power for 6 weeks a year?

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No one likes paying for anything on this board, what kind of priorities do people have out there. I would think paying Â£90.00 to Â£200.00 per month for ESSENTIAL utilities is the norm and kind of necessary for survival.

If you were to try to be totally self-sufficient in all necessary things and maintain your current quality of life you would soon find that you spent all your time locating sources of potable water, carrying water, maintaining/developing power supplies, growing crops. Etc.

You'd be knackered most of the time and ultimately it would be more expensive in both time and resources to do any of these things on such a micro scale.

What would the point be?

Yeah - I saw some debate on how much baked beans cost one day. Someone was worried about 20p a can.

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Try a company called Utility Warehouse, they can review all of your bills and try and beat the tariff, they then give you one bill with each utility itemised. I have heard they are very good and for the last few years I understand they have won a few Which? awards....Might be worth a try. ( i do not work for them by the way)